All Types of Mortality Salience Are Not Equal: the Effect of Contemplating Natural Versus Unnatural Death on Materialism Behavior

Zhi Wang, Chinese University of Hong Kong, China

While previous research on Terror Management Theory (TMT) argues that Mortality Salience drives individuals behave differently than they otherwise would, literature hasn’t differentiated behaviors caused by contemplating of death in different ways (unnatural vs. natural death). This research aims to fulfill this gap by synthesizing TMT and Just World Theory.